Bad Arolsen, Germany
The International Committee of the Red Cross decided this week to open its vast archive of Nazi documents. The Nazis burned 90 percent of their documents when they realized they were about to lose World War II. But about 40 million pages of death registers, concentration camp records, transport lists, and internal communications survived. The name index refers to 17.5 million victims. The archive was closed in 1955 out of concerns for Holocaust victims’ privacy. Now it is to be released to Holocaust institutions in 11 countries, which will make the documents available to researchers. The U.S., France, and Germany are donating money to be used to digitally scan the documents for transmission.
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